Heretaunga Intermediate School librarian Rona Ahern hasn’t riden a bike in years. She will be 80 later this year but that didn’t deter her from doing her bit to help the school in this month’s BikeWise Challenge.February 27th, 2012

Hastings school librarian joins BikeWise challenge

Heretaunga Intermediate School librarian Rona Ahern hasn’t riden a bike in years. She will be 80 later this year but that didn’t deter her from doing her bit to help the school in this month’s BikeWise Challenge.

Rona Ahern says “I used to bike regularly but it’s been quite a long time since I have been for a ride. I was a bit concerned about venturing out on two wheels but it turned out that the school had a trike and that made me feel a little more comfortable about riding.”

“After a little ride around in the school library, I felt confident enough to venture out onto the schoolgrounds. My 10 minute ride ended up being 15 minutes and that has added to the schools BikeWise Challenge tally” Rona Ahern says.

“It was great to get back on the bike after all these years and it took the BikeWise Challenge to motivate me. I am happy that I was able to contribute to the school team and it gave me a nice bit of exercise as well.”

Heretaunga Intermediate has 33 staff members and 17 of them have already taken up the challenge and clocked up enough kilometers to be part of the team.

The National BikeWise Challenge is a fun competition being held during February and is being supported by Hastings District Council’s iWay project. It encourages work colleagues to get on their bike and become part of the business team.

iWay is a Hastings District council project which aims to make cycling and walking easy safe and fun. You can find out the latest on iWay at www.iway.org.nz